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Vacation, last half of day 3 and day 4
Fourth of July in Bend, Oregon is a very... interesting event. The entire town is fireworks-happy. And there's no offical 'gathering place' to watch the big fireworks show. There were people in parking lots, on roofs, alongside the road... it was almost a carnival atmosphere. There were TNT-sale tents everywhere, and fireworks were being sold in all of the big supermarkets, so everyone had a big supply of crackers and rockets and bits of lithium and other bits of flamable explosives. And they lit them at a pretty steady clip. The complex of parking lots we stopped in were constantly lit up by a steady stream of firecrackers and such. The air was full of crashes, screaming, and sonic-boom type sounds. There were even some flare-gun type explosives, some of which were quite elaborate. As it got dark, the madness increased. It looked like the whole town was on fire, with all of the explosives going off. And people were still driving around - even throught the parking lots that had turned into amateur demolition zones. One little kid nearly got creamed when the driver of a huge pickup truck couldn't see over his massive hood to see the kid crouched on the ground next to his recently burned-out firework. Verrry scary. The guy had an inch of clearance, if that. Some other random guy shouted profanities at his taillights, and everyone went back to blowing Bend to kingdom come. Then the fireworks show started - someone had hauled a couple firework cannons up to the top of the one hill in town and had somewhat managed to set them to music, which one of the local radio stations played. After the show was over, the pyromania showed itself again. We went home, however...
Watched A.I. last night. Is that the strangest movie ever, or what? There's some huge plotholes too. But I rather liked Joe. He was a likeable mecha... though I suppose in more than one way. I loved Teddy though. I want a Teddy.
Even though we got to bed around one, we were still up by 730. Yeah, we're nuts. We drove out to Sisters for breakfast - let me tell you, they're generous with breakfast in Sisters. I highly recommend 'The Ski Inn'. Lots and lots of food, very tasty, none too healthy on the most part, not too expensive. And they have really nice people working there.
Then came the long drive through the Wilamete (sp?) Valley. I know that's not spelled right, but I'm being too much of a lazy bum at the moment to go look it up. It was very pretty, and I added that to the list of 'Places Dad Could Retire', even though there isn't much in the way of organized towns out there. We stopped at a little coffee shack (another benefit of Oregon - there's expresso places everywhere!) for a jolt. Mom ordered a latte, and was asked if she wanted it wet or dry. We all kind of stared at each other - isn't all coffee rather wet? The lady took pity on us and explained that she meant did she want it to be half foam or all foam. Ah. Still confusing. I was a good girl and got water, which was actually pretty necessary since it was getting warm outside.
Four or so hours later we decided that lunch would be a good thing, and if we didn't eat it soon, we might as well call it dinner. We stopped at a nice little rest stop (another benefit of Oregon over CA - CA rest stops are... gross) and had a little picnic lunch - french bread, goat cheese, more of that salsa stuff, and more salami. Yum. With cherries for dessert, I was a happy cookie.
Finally, finally we reached Seattle. After getting throughly lost on the city streets, we found our hotel. It's rather Matrix-like in construction, since you can wander around for ages and still not find your room. They actually provide maps at the door. O.o When we finally found our room, we were rather floored. There's two bedrooms! And a full kitchen! I'm glad we'll be hear for more than one night. Things like this deserve to be savored. Hopefully we'll pick up some good stuff at Pike's Farmers Market tomorrow. *grins happily* Blueberry season is still on here! We bought a huge basket of blueberries yesterday and had those with cottage cheese for dinner last night. Yumyumyum. I've been missing my fresh fruit meals. It's the best part of summer.
After we settled in, sis and I went to the Sci-Fi museum right down the street. It's pretty cool - lots of artifacts from movies and TV shows, along with some neat books. They had some scripts of Uhura's from Star Trek (with some strange equations - 12-3=9=Mudd. Huh? They also had some of the weapons used in Doctor Who (The Happiness Gun!) and a Dalek, as well as one of the aliens from the movies of the same name, the Terminator and bits of his nemesis, Will Robinsons' outfit, a klingon mask along with his bat'leth and other bits of klingon weapondry, lots of phasers and rifles and a whole bunch of other stuff. Pretty neat.
Dinner was accidentally at a pretty pricy restraunt (it sounded cheaper on the web), but it was tasty anyway. Evidently I still look under 21 to some people, because the waiter immediately took away my wine glass. Not that I was going to use it anyway, but I was amused.
Tommorow's the Van Gogh exhibit! This is Reporter!Bodldops signing off.
Watched A.I. last night. Is that the strangest movie ever, or what? There's some huge plotholes too. But I rather liked Joe. He was a likeable mecha... though I suppose in more than one way. I loved Teddy though. I want a Teddy.
Even though we got to bed around one, we were still up by 730. Yeah, we're nuts. We drove out to Sisters for breakfast - let me tell you, they're generous with breakfast in Sisters. I highly recommend 'The Ski Inn'. Lots and lots of food, very tasty, none too healthy on the most part, not too expensive. And they have really nice people working there.
Then came the long drive through the Wilamete (sp?) Valley. I know that's not spelled right, but I'm being too much of a lazy bum at the moment to go look it up. It was very pretty, and I added that to the list of 'Places Dad Could Retire', even though there isn't much in the way of organized towns out there. We stopped at a little coffee shack (another benefit of Oregon - there's expresso places everywhere!) for a jolt. Mom ordered a latte, and was asked if she wanted it wet or dry. We all kind of stared at each other - isn't all coffee rather wet? The lady took pity on us and explained that she meant did she want it to be half foam or all foam. Ah. Still confusing. I was a good girl and got water, which was actually pretty necessary since it was getting warm outside.
Four or so hours later we decided that lunch would be a good thing, and if we didn't eat it soon, we might as well call it dinner. We stopped at a nice little rest stop (another benefit of Oregon over CA - CA rest stops are... gross) and had a little picnic lunch - french bread, goat cheese, more of that salsa stuff, and more salami. Yum. With cherries for dessert, I was a happy cookie.
Finally, finally we reached Seattle. After getting throughly lost on the city streets, we found our hotel. It's rather Matrix-like in construction, since you can wander around for ages and still not find your room. They actually provide maps at the door. O.o When we finally found our room, we were rather floored. There's two bedrooms! And a full kitchen! I'm glad we'll be hear for more than one night. Things like this deserve to be savored. Hopefully we'll pick up some good stuff at Pike's Farmers Market tomorrow. *grins happily* Blueberry season is still on here! We bought a huge basket of blueberries yesterday and had those with cottage cheese for dinner last night. Yumyumyum. I've been missing my fresh fruit meals. It's the best part of summer.
After we settled in, sis and I went to the Sci-Fi museum right down the street. It's pretty cool - lots of artifacts from movies and TV shows, along with some neat books. They had some scripts of Uhura's from Star Trek (with some strange equations - 12-3=9=Mudd. Huh? They also had some of the weapons used in Doctor Who (The Happiness Gun!) and a Dalek, as well as one of the aliens from the movies of the same name, the Terminator and bits of his nemesis, Will Robinsons' outfit, a klingon mask along with his bat'leth and other bits of klingon weapondry, lots of phasers and rifles and a whole bunch of other stuff. Pretty neat.
Dinner was accidentally at a pretty pricy restraunt (it sounded cheaper on the web), but it was tasty anyway. Evidently I still look under 21 to some people, because the waiter immediately took away my wine glass. Not that I was going to use it anyway, but I was amused.
Tommorow's the Van Gogh exhibit! This is Reporter!Bodldops signing off.